


the slats are your memories; the sunlight is your pain

by anotherbuskitten



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Ficlet, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-13
Updated: 2020-08-13
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:00:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25869334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anotherbuskitten/pseuds/anotherbuskitten
Summary: Of course Remus smells Sirius in the amortentia.
Relationships: Sirius Black & Remus Lupin, Sirius Black & Remus Lupin & Peter Pettigrew & James Potter
Comments: 1
Kudos: 5





	the slats are your memories; the sunlight is your pain

Of course Remus smells Sirius in the amortentia, he thinks, it’s only natural. He thinks it again later – much later, 29 and squatting in a building that must have once belonged to a talented potioneer because the remnants are everywhere.

And so what if he sniffs the love potion every now and then? So what?

He misses the things he smells in it – misses the almost-untouched-by-man smell of the Hogwarts grounds and the teenage boy smell of his dormitory, he misses James’ quidditch oils and Peter’s shaving cream, and Lily’s rose perfume.

And yes. He misses Sirius’ petrol stained clothes and defiant muggle shampoos and overly soaped hands. He misses all of those things.

Of course he does. Those were the happiest days of his life.

(He misses the blood under his fingernails that proved he was doing something worthwhile, that he was fighting, that he was useful. But that’s still the best reason for why he smells blood.)

And it makes sense that the scents of Sirius are the loudest – because Sirius is the only one still alive, the only one who he could find and breathe in again. The others are dirt and ash and bone and magic can’t preserve their lives any more than it could bring them back.

It’s almost a betrayal four years later when he buries he nose in Sirius’ shoulder and it smells of nothing that he knows, of death and pain and yearning rage, of the Shrieking Shack.

He’s always hated the shrieking shack.

**Author's Note:**

> Remus thinks – or is deluding himself, I can’t quite tell – that the smells in amortentia come purely from the magic and not from his memory which is preserving the memory of Sirius more than the others partially because Sirius is still out there, but mostly because Remus misses him twice over; once for the boy he was and once for the man Remus thought he was.
> 
> And a little because Remus has always hated the things that keep him alive (should I write that instead? over the years: he hates the wolf but if he hadn't been bitten he would have been killed, he hates his parents for loving him when all he does is hurt them, he hates hogwarts because it doesn't want him, he hates his friends for being able to change whenever they want, he hates the war but it's all he has left, he hates Sirius again and again and again but never as much as he longs for him)


End file.
